I really liked them. They made me feel... uncomfortable at times, I suppose it was a mixture of the empty-hearted and unfamiliar nature of Umbriel, where most of the story is set, and how it seemed to be destroying the characters, particularly Annaig, who I swapped between liking and hating several times, but I think it's good it got me invested and emotionally involved in the characters and story like that. My favourite characters were Glim and Attrebus (followed closely by Sul) and I loved the lore itincluded and expanded upon. I think they did focus a bit too much on the cooking at times (and in the kitchens in general), though. I got tired of hearing about the different ways in which Annaig and the other chefs manipulated the flavours and invented new ones to please the lords in ridiculous ways, even if it was interesting in small doses.

Nobody even has thoughts on these books?

It's a bit hard to buy them where I am, even the normal webshops don't carry them and I haven't found a single bookstore that carries these books yet.

From what I've seen and heard so far however I'm not a big fan, I don't really like the things they introduced like a giant floating city. Just doesn't make me happy

Do you have something against floating cities in concept?

It just didn't fit the already established lore for me, it was just something new and I have a problem with that. Also a giant robot thing to hold up the moon, what? Have the Dunmer become Dwemer now?

Seriously though, my problems with the book come entirely from the fact that I don't like the new lore and stuff they introduce. As I haven't actually read the books except for a few lose chapters it's hard for me to judge how good the story actually is. But I still don't like it.

How does it clash with existing lore? A machine that uses the power of souls to create magical force could have been created if necessary, as it was, and I don't understand why the flying city from Oblivion concept contradicts anything. Personally I liked the lore in it. It felt creative, bizzare and inventive, and not so mundane and traditional, like Skyrim and Oblivion's stories largely seemed to be. It was more like Morrowind in that respect.

It doesn't necessarily contradict it was just new, and I prefer stuff like that to be introduced in things other then books. The fact that I don't like the idea behind it, makes it even less likeable for me. The machine however remains odd, for years nobody was able of inventing anykind of machine or use souls to power anything, and all of a sudden the Dunmer can? What? Why? How? Who taught them?

the Mages guild that no longer existed? The Telvanni that probably couldn't be bothered? It just seems strange...

I guess I can understand what you're saying about the Ingenium. It was a rather sudden invention. The mages guild understandably dissolved because of the collapse of the Septim Empire. Not sure what you mean about the Telvanni. As for not liking it purely because it was new, well I can't really understand that perspective.

The Telvanni never seemed to care about anything that happened outside of their city, it just makes me wonder how they invented the thing when the best and most powerful of the Telvanni mages were probably to busy sitting around in their house doing nothing.

I'll admit that the reason I don't like it is stupid, it's probably for a large part because I have so far been unable to acquire the books and then I tend to look at the negative points, instead of the entire story. Because now I just have a thing that exists without any explanation. I'd imagine reading the books would change that. I'll buy them if I get the chance sometime, and maybe that will change my mind. So far however, whether logical or not, I don't think it's all that interesting.

For an author who isn't originally a part of Bethesda I'd say he nailed the lore pretty good. At least you see that he's put some effort into it and studied up quite a lot. Is it perfect? No, but I don't think anyone expected it to be.

Attrebus was a fun character to read about in the first book. I think that's where most of his character development lies. In the second book he mostly just seems to follow Sul around and do what he's told, and by the end of that book I found that I still did not respect him very much at all.

Sul was a mildly interesting character, but seemed far too shallow overall. Consequently, when he died I was not emotionally affected at all.

I never really liked Annaig all that much. While its true that she was forced to do many of the things she did simply to survive, at the same time you are never given much of a chance to like her in the first place because you never see her do anything in either of the books that particularly stands out as being selfless, save for the very end of the book when she allows Mere-Glim to save the trees in the Fringe Gyre and leave with them. She doesn't seem to end up very happy in the end of the book, either - the only person of interest she has left in the world is this Attrebus jerk whom even she doesn't seem to care about very much.

Colin was very, very flat. His girlfriend's betrayal was a poorly executed plot twist for multiple reasons. Needless to say, I didn't care to see either of them die - they seemed to simply be tools used by the author to show the reader how Umbriel came to Nirn.

Mere-Glim was my favorite character in the book. He is rather strange in many ways (mostly because he's an Argonian ) but his naturally selfless nature makes him really likable IMO. Retrospectively, it was really dumb of him to get himself wrapped up with the inhabitants of Umbriel - if he had kept his place and stuck with his friend Annaig to the end, then everything would've worked out fine. Nevertheless, I was really saddened at the end of the book when he chose to leave Annaig to take the trees in the Fringe Gyre home. Perhaps it was all he could do with himself at that point, considering he could no longer communicate with the Hist on Tamriel. But he doesn't seem to be particularly happy with his decision in the epilogue, and frankly, neither am I. I like to take hope in the possibility that he's still on Nirn in a place where the Hist grow unhindered (which makes the most sense IMHO - how else could these trees be related to the hist unless they come from the same realm?).

Who says the Hist originally came from Nirn? Their origins seem rather mysterious. It wasn't the Hist that Mere-Glim was with, because he's an Umbrielian now, and he can sense these trees but presumably not the Hist as he did as an Argonian (as conversely he couldn't fully hear the Umbriel trees while he was Argonian). I liked Attrebus. He was a flawed character, somewhat naive and easily affected by his immediate emotions, but also quite noble and selfless, and when it came down to it, actually fairly smart, despite his not realising that he was brought up to have everything on a silver platter. I didn't like Annaig that much as a person, her betrayal of Slyr, for example, was completely unnecessary, but she intentionally killed her, and with careful planning with malicious intent. But as a character she was interesting. I agree on Colin being a bit of a flat character. He was mostly just telling the story, but I did find it a good story and I certainly wasn't bored during those parts of the book, even if he himself isn't the most complex. I don't really know at all why Brennus and Mazgar's story was in the second book, they had practically no effect on the overall events of the story.

No one says the Hist came from Nirn. I am simply suggesting it as the possibility that it is.

Yes, I know. But the books strongly suggest that the trees in the Fringe Gyre are related to the Hist, and if this is true, then it follows that the FG trees and the Hist share a common birthplace. Whether this is Nirn or somewhere else entirely is completely unknown; the epilogue of the second book only makes it clear that this was not Clavicus Vile's realm. But here's something to consider: when Mere-Glim is taken to the home of the Hist, he makes a point of noticing that the realm is peaceful and appears uninhabited. The most likely explanations, then, are that either (1) he has been taken to another continent on Nirn where the Hist grow freely, as I speculated; (2) He has been transported through time to a point when the Hist were the only sentient creatures on Nirn; or (3) He was taken to a completely undocumented and (probably lordless, save possibly for the Hist themselves) realm that we've never heard of. From what little information we've been given, all of these answers are equally likely.

They were probably placed in the story so that we could witness the destruction Umbriel was sowing across Tamriel. But yes, they were very boring to read about.